


What Do You Call...?

by turnedherbrain



Category: Humans (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, First Dates, Fluff and Humor, Imagined Scene, Leotilda, Love, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 07:26:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14869331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turnedherbrain/pseuds/turnedherbrain
Summary: Imagined scene for s3 e4Spoilers for s3 eps 1-3 :)





	What Do You Call...?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RocknVaughn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RocknVaughn/gifts).



> Leo and Mattie go on a first date.

OK Mattie, she told herself. It’s not a first date. At least, not in the usual sense of the word.

What do you call it, when you have liked someone for the longest time? When you have sat by their bedside, willing them to be well, for more than a year? When you have stumbled out a near-confession of what they mean to you? When you ended that same night with a kiss?

Most people starting relationships didn’t have this tangled mass of feelings behind them already. Most people got to know one another, without saving the other person’s life or rescuing them from the clutches of cougars...

At least that had been more like normality, more like usual human behaviour. But she would need to stay by him, to ensure he wasn’t ensnared by his own innocence.

It was strange. When they’d first met, he had the studied air of a jaded hacker - ‘I can do that: can you do better?’ - a deliberate veneer. But since his... resuscitation? Resurrection...? Since that... miracle revival, he’d been like a boy who’s shown a picture encyclopaedia of the world: a book he longs to read for himself, but can’t yet pronounce all the people and places within it.

So here she was - here they were - about to go on their first proper date. Leo had asked her with a shy gentility that she’d found sweetly charming. Not that she had shown it, of course. She’d shown far too much, gone way too far the first night, and wanted to bring it down to a normal, human pattern of acknowledging how they felt.

She took one last glance in the mirror, and breathed out to calm the persistent flutter in her chest.

Leo was standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking up like an expectant prom night suitor, waiting for her to descend. His natural smile upon seeing her calmed the nerves she wasn’t showing.

‘Shall we?’ he asked, bowing slightly and holding out his arm as a gallant gesture.

Mattie frowned, then quickly understood: ‘Has Soph been making you watch Disney films?’

‘Ummm... a few?’ admitted Leo. He had wondered whether all the bowing and dancing was quite necessary. But Mattie looked prettier than a thousand princesses. Could he tell her that? Maybe that was too much. Maybe he should wait. But for how long?

‘Mum! We’re off!’ she shouted down the corridor to the lounge, taking Leo’s hand instead.

‘OK! Don’t be back too late!’ called Laura in return. Looking at the two of them departing, she reached for her phone, wondering again whether to call Mia about their children and discuss What Was Going On. Then decided: no. Mattie was an adult now. Leo was - well, she didn’t really know, but his innocence was something pure and as-yet untainted in this dark time.

‘What’s this place we’re going to?’ Leo asked with excited curiosity in the taxi, as streetfuls of blank-faced houses blurred by. All those humans, living their mostly harmless lives, thought Mattie. She was trying to keep happy on the outside, even though her insides were full of fears and doubts. Not about _them_. About everything else.

‘It’s a new place down at the riverside complex. Deckard’s. It’s like an American diner? Waitresses in 50s-style uniform, red leather booths, milkshakes, burgers. That kind of thing.’

Mattie could tell from Leo’s openly wondering expression, he didn’t know which ‘kind of thing’ she was talking about, so she simply squeezed his hand tighter and said: ‘You’ll see.’

They got to the restaurant and into their booth without much mishap. Leo decided to order the same as Mattie (‘What you’re having sounds perfect.’) rather than have to go over much of the menu, which could have been written in another language. The ‘Big O’ milkshake - described as ‘blended Oreos with cream and more cream’ was particularly mysterious.

‘Mia didn’t cook burgers. She said the high cholesterol content wasn’t good for me,’ he confessed, as their burger stacks, chunky fries, ‘slaw, and milkshakes served in chilled cocktail shakers arrived. His gaze was struggling to take in this brave new world and all the wonders in it.

‘Mia’s right,’ laughed Mattie. ‘This meal is truly bad for us. But we wouldn’t be human if we didn’t have a blow-out every now and again.’

‘That’s right,’ agreed Leo, enjoying his first mouthfuls. ‘And this... is... mmm... delicious!’

Mattie saw his face, so happy, and felt that unbidden flutter inside again. His re-acquaintance - his acquaintance - with the human world was beyond endearing.

Halfway through their main course, Mattie’s initial nervousness had vanished. Their hands had gradually inched together and by the time they’d shared dessert, they were back to holding hands, without as much hesitation or shyness as before.

At the end of the meal, the waitress pointed out they had a free play of the mini jukebox at their table, a tiny Wurlitzer that proclaimed it held ‘over 300 of the classics’. Digitally and faithfully reproduced, of course.

‘Oh wait - I know some of these!’ said Leo as they flipped through the songs. ‘Dad had them - on these old LPs - and Fred used to play them and sing along.’

‘Can you imagine a world where music was a double-sided, 12-track disc?’ laughed Mattie. ‘We’re so spoilt for choice now, and we don’t even know it.’

‘OK - you choose,’ said Leo, having scanned most of the options. ‘It’s only right.’

‘Why?’ questioned Mattie, thinking he was suggesting some misguided ‘ladies first’ choice which, no matter how generous, didn’t fit with her feminist views.

‘I chose the dessert, so it’s your turn!’ he replied. And Chocolate Marvel wasn’t a bad description for what they’d just eaten.

‘OK.’ Mattie took her hand away from his just for a minute, so she could go through the jukebox catalogue one more time. Leo studied the look of concentration on her face and decided he liked that look very much; that he liked everything about her.

‘Have you made your selection yet?’ he teased.

Mattie looked up, smiled, and pressed a button.

‘What did you choose?’ he asked, impatient to know. He didn’t recognise the opening bars of the song as the heavy bass thrummed. Mattie deliberately made herself busy, licking out the last of the chocolate sundae from the glass with her index finger, their two spoons still nested side by side.

 

_‘You’re just too good to be true_

_I can’t keep my eyes off you_

_You’d be like heaven to touch_

_I want to hold you so much...’_

 

‘Cheesy, right?’ Mattie confessed at her choice.

Leo shook his head. He didn’t know what that word meant. But he understood the message in the song. He leaned forward, so that he could listen to the music and remember it, as part of this night. This night he was trying to commit to memory. Because if that song ever played again, he wanted to recall this entire, wonderful moment.

**Author's Note:**

> \- Lyrics from ‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You’ Andy Williams  
> \- References for ‘mostly harmless’, ‘Deckard’s’ and ‘brave new world...’ (from ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy’, ‘Blade Runner’ and ‘The Tempest’ respectively)  
> \- Deckard’s also appears in another Leotilda fic: [‘Poetry, an A-Z’](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11530614), that time as an off-campus bar at an American university :)


End file.
